Different
by GaleSynch
Summary: AU, He was different from the men she'd dealt with in the past. One-shot. Prince Freyjadour x Lucretia Merces. 2/100.


**Series:** Suikoden V  
**Prompt:** Different.  
**Summary: **AU, He was different than the rest of the men she'd seen and she found herself doing everything with sincerity she'd never had before.  
**Disclaimer: **I do not own anything you recognize.  
**Rating: **T  
**Genre: **Romance.  
**Pairings: **Prince Freyjadour Falenas x Lucretia Merces.  
**Warnings: **Nothing.

* * *

They all said and agreed that she'd just play and entertain him for awhile, before she devoured him alive. Personally, Lurectia Merces found this amusing; that people feared her that much to make such assumptions. Of course, she made the appropriate offended and hurt response when she heard the people said that and her two faithful bodyguards were quick to defend her. But deep down, she wasn't hurt at all by their thoughts.

She didn't mind. She didn't care.

She was the Prince's tactician and nothing more. She was to advice him and lead him to success at every battle. She was the greatest tactician in Sol-Falena—and perhaps, the whole wide world—and men craved to have her on their side. She knew they would follow her every command to ensure their own success, not knowing that she was leading them to their doom she was already bored and their goals were not something she agreed with.

But the Prince of the Falenan Royal Family was different than those men she'd served before.

He didn't give her his blind trust like all those men before her. He wanted her to earn it and though he didn't say it out loud—he was a very silent boy—she saw it from his actions and body language: how his beautifully luminous eyes would narrow when she made a cryptic remark or when she made a request from him.

There was also that aberration again; request. She had to request from him, she could never order him around.

Strange how Lord Barrows could and she couldn't. Did that mean she was lower than that fat lard? Never!

The Prince was thought of as a puppet by the Barrows but when she actually spoke to him, he didn't seem like a puppet nor did he seem to be easily manipulated. The more time she spent by his side in battles and out of it, she realized she had seen things wrong. No one had been ordering the silver-haired boy around, to him, they had merely been making suggestions and he'd gone along with it.

Lucretia thought he was a mindless, emotionless puppet but he was not.

Lucretia wondered why he was so different. She never confronted him on it but people were starting to notice her fascinating curiosity in the boy. Perhaps it was far too obvious in her eyes, she thought as she found herself facing the Prince's overprotective aunt.

Sialeeds' eyes narrowed. "What are you planning on doing to my nephew, Lucretia?" The royal woman spat her name with such distaste and venom she was surprised she hadn't been smeared into bean paste already.

The tactician shrugged, fanning herself with her feather fan as she spoke, "I do not know what you're talking about."

"Don't play dumb with me—" the woman growled but was interrupted by the loud and resounding gong, signifying dinner time.

Lucretia smiled unsympathetically, "Perhaps another time?"

Seething, the other woman stomped off. They never did managed to continue their conversation about the Prince because the next time Lucretia saw Sialeeds was when the latter was at her deathbed.

"Lucretia," the dying woman once again called her name with negative emotions but there was that grudging respect and gratefulness. "Watch over my nephew would you? He'll be hopeless without you now that I'm no longer there for him..." Weakly, she grasped her hand; Lucretia didn't shy away. "Don't... harm—" the woman never spoke again.

Lucretia reached out to close her eyes, closing her own, murmuring so soft no one heard her, "I always have been watching him."

All too soon, the war ended and her job over. She approached the Prince once the coast was clear, when they were far from curious eyes and prying ears and oh, especially the Prince's new and nosy bodyguard.

"It had been fun, by your side," she said, smiling sincerely, genuinely and she was only mildly surprised. Had spending time with the Prince changed her so? She wasn't sure she liked the change. "But with every meeting, there must be a parting. Fare thee well, Prince, I wish you a happy life."

This time, she was surprised by her own words; words she'd never though she'd wished to others and she smiled wryly at the sentimental being she was slowly turning into. Without waiting for the boy's answer, she turned and started down the stairs when he grasped her hand, stopping her descent.

It had occurred to her that people may easily see them but she brushed the thought off, not caring, and turned inquiringly to the Prince who frowned down at her.

"I never said you could leave," the new Commander of the Queen's Knights said.

"This is a free-country, Your Highness," Lucretia retorted, with no bite in it, smiling softly. "I'm free to leave however I wish."

"I never dismissed you from my service."

"Oh, really? The implication was there; I believed my use to you was over?"

"You're not a tool, you never were to me," the Prince squeezed her hand, as if trying to tell her something he didn't say out loud. "Don't go. Our time to part hasn't come yet." The look on his face was one full of pain and sadness and Lucretia understood why, after the war, everyone had gone their separate ways and the Prince's bodyguard and many other friends now lay six-feet under, rotting away. The Prince, no matter how different he was from the men she'd had in her life, was still a boy. He wasn't ready for so many losses.

"I see."

The next day, rumors spread like wildfire to the townspeople, that Lucretia was the Prince's mistress. Unlike years ago when she'd been accused as Marshal Godwin's mistress, she wasn't irked nor was she annoyed.

She smirked wryly at the Prince's befuddled expression, his face was an interesting shade of crimson when an innocent child in the castle had asked when they were going to get married.

Yes, life here with her Prince wouldn't be bored and she supposed it was the time to shed masks and lies.

Here, Lucretia finally could be happy.


End file.
